“Roxy? For the ceremony, there are still a few garlands to hang behind the gazebo,” a man from the restaurant staff tells me.
I take the box of garlands from him and head toward the back of the gazebo, savoring a few moments of peace. Back here, the event’s hustle and bustle fades to a dull roar, and I only now realize how much my ears were ringing. I scan the area for the bare spot, but I frown when I can’t find a single empty tree.
A twig snaps to my left, and a shiver snakes down my spine.
I’m two hundred yards from the restaurant. Two hundred yards too far from safety.
Why the hell didn’t I ask Yuri to help me?The bitter taste of regret coats my tongue, but I refuse to turn back.
From the same direction, I hear shuffling, and the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.
RUN!
The command triggers no physical reaction. This goddamn fear has me paralyzed. I can go toe to toe with anyone, but nothim.
Not the man who stole my childhood, the one who gave me nightmares for days on end, filled with the image of my mother’s vacant eyes. In his desperation, my father hadn’t even bothered to cover her body before he pulled me out of that closet. The moment I stepped into the kitchen, my world had shattered into a million pieces.
My mother used to call meamorino, her "little love." My mother let me dress in sequins and glitter. My mother told me how beautiful I was. My mother made sure I always had fluffy socks on my feet because they were always cold.
I already know there are tears in my eyes the moment I feel him less than three feet away.
“You didn’t like my flower?” His voice is warped, distorted, and a tremor takes over my body.
He’s so close I can feel his body heat against my back, and even though every alarm in my head is screaming at me to do something, I can’t move. I knew he would come for me one day. I don’t know how he didn’t find me in that closet that night, I don’t know why he never approached me before now, and I don’t know why I can’t break through this wretched numbness.
His hand, covered in a leather glove, makes contact with my neck. My muscles must react on pure instinct, because I lunge six feet forward and whirl around to face him.
He’s wearing a Halloween mask—a Guy Fawkes mask—a long, brown wool coat, and boots.
“I like how red looks on you. It makes you look more likeher.”
He doesn’t have to tell me who "her" is. I remember her wearing red to every party, in all its different shades. Her black hair and olive skin glowed every time she wore that color. A color I will now eradicate from my wardrobe even if it is my favorite.
“Why her?” is all my brain can form, and I know my tears don’t escape his notice.
For a few moments, he just studies me, then takes a step in my direction.
Before he can get any closer, a blade slices through the air and sinks into his back. The sound of his agony is drowned out by Damien’s voice, shouting from maybe a hundred feet away.
“ROXANNE, RUN!”
Somehow, his voice unlocks my body, and I do exactly that.
I don’t look back. I don’t know how far I’ve gotten, but I can’t have made it more than fifty yards before I stop dead in my tracks.
I can’t leave him alone with that psychopath.Damien may be the head of the Polish mafia, but that man murdered four women in their own homes, leaving nothing behind but a goddamn flower. He’s not stupid.
The five-year-old version of me is screaming to keep running, to put as much distance as possible between myself and the man who killed my mother—and with her, any chance at a loving childhood. But the Roxy I am now can only see the image of Damien from that morning when he hadn’t slept a wink all nightfor my sake. Damien, who always breaks into a full-toothed grin when he sees me walking toward him. This infuriating man who has somehow gotten under my skin.
I barely take ten steps back before he's striding toward me, brow furrowed, closing the distance until he pins me against the nearest tree trunk.
“Why the hell are you still here?” he asks, his voice tight with anger as his hands cup my face.
“You were in danger,” I reply weakly, slightly embarrassed that I’m showing I care enough about his safety to risk my own.
A look of surprise flashes across his face at my confession. In the next second, his mouth covers mine, and every bit of anxiety, every tense molecule in my body, surrenders. He tastes like chamomile tea and smoke, a combination that makes me pull him even closer.
It's the kind of kiss that makes time slow down, that turns the noise of the world into a distant murmur. I tell myself I’m just allowing a few seconds of release, a few seconds where I don’t have to keep this shield up. A few seconds where I want to believe that someone like him wants only me. Just as I am.
